Creation Sharing New Timetable For Dresden - Riesa

Before anyone asks, yes, the Expert 101 and the 218 are _so_ going to be in the timetable as soon as I can get my hands on them.

(Nothing else to report at the moment - university has started again this week so I haven't found time for the Trilex trains yet)

 

Quite a while ago, I answered the question on what DLC was going to be required, and since then quite a lot has happened. DLC has been announced and come out, and of course I've simply changed my mind on a few things, so I figured it's time for an update. Subject to change, of course. Here are my plans from way back when:

As of right now, this is what I'm intending to do:

• Dresden-Riesa only
  S1, S2, AI S3, Talent II RE15, RE18, and RB31 services, RE50
  Unit freight trains featuring Habbiins, Laaers, Sggmrss & Zacns wagons
  Most local freight trains
  
• Rosenheim-Salzburg
  Dosto RE15, RE18, and RB31 services, AI RE3, RB30, and RB45 services (subject to DTG fixing the coupling bug, otherwise these will use the DRA Dostos)
• Maintalbahn
  S8, RE1, RE2, RB60, RB61 (all playable between Dresden Hbf and Dresden-Neustadt), AI RB33
  
• Kassel-Würzburg
  ICEs (playable and AI)
• Expert 101
  InterCities (playable and AI)
• Vectron + Expert 101
  EuroCities (playable between Dresden Hbf and Dresden-Neustadt), one EuroNight per day to and from Riesa (subject to DTG fixing the Vectron door controls bug, otherwise these will use just the 101)
  
• Vectron
  Unit freight trains using Eanos wagons
• Linke Rheinstrecke
  Railtours
  Unit freight trains using Tadgs and Shimmns-U wagons
• Vectron + Linke Rheinstrecke
  Mixed freight trains
• Class 218
  Extra through freight trains (some of these may require the Vectron and Linke Rheinstrecke too)
  Some additional local freight trains

It looks longer because it's more detailed, but these are in fact just 7 addons, as opposed to 11 in the old list. Of course if you do have more German add-ons, you'll be able to use content from many of them through substitution, but they won't add any new services.

 

And what about the Niddertalbahn ?

 

It won't unlock any layers. I was only ever going to use the 628 on one railtour, which is now going to use the 642 by default, and have the 628 sub in instead.

 

This DLCs are all required in order for the mod to work?

 

No, it will still work even if you only have DRA. If you don't have an addon, you simply won't get the trains that it provides.

 

Are any layers unlocked by the regular Br 101 or is the Expert 101 a must have for IC Services?

 

Unless DTG make some pretty substantial changes to the way that layers work, it'll be the Expert 101 only.

 

I managed to make space for the Trilex trains today, so I can add them over the coming days. To free up space on platforms 5 and 7, I put most S8 trains onto platform 2, and the RE50 has moved to platform 6.

 

I’m visiting Dresden from the US right now. Obviously exploring the spots I’ve driven in game. It’s surreal.
I can’t wait to check out this new timetable!

 

I hope you enjoy your stay! Hopefully you know about the steam locomotive festival happening on the weekend?

 

mkraehe#6051 I’m flying home tomorrow unfortunately but I did see the narrow gauge at Radebeul Ost.
Dresden reminds a lot of Boston, where I’m from. It’s rich in history and extremely quiet at night. Great town. Much different from Munich and Berlin, which are like New York City.
I did Munich, Nuremberg, Hamburg, Berlin, and Dresden over 10 days. Feeling the G forces on the ICE was awesome.

 

It has been reported by someone on the TSC Discord that the 111 now works with the n-Wagen as AI, which possibly means the Dostos have been fixed too!

 

I'm finally making some progress with the Trilex trains! I got as far as about 7 AM today, including all shunting moves and coupling/uncoupling moves.


Also, the Salzburg-Rosenheim Dostos got fixed in the latest TSW update. Since they're no longer making the 143s all jittery, I have allowed them to return to Dresden. Thanks for the heads up, Perks390!

 

After a few days in the timetable mines, I'm so happy to report that I've got all the Trilex services working!

Getting these into the timetable was much more complicated than I had expected. Adding this one layer took me a whole month! I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to working with trains that are not Desiros again.


Rush hour has started a while ago, and there is only one Desiro still stabled in the sidings at Dresden Hbf. It will soon couple to the RE1 that's just arriving to form a three-unit set for for the return working.

These sidings will start out full in the early morning. They empty and fill again twice over the course of the day, as rush hour starts and ends. It's very satisfying to watch in the Timetable Playback tool.

 

That looks really exciting, it's a shame that just adding one service causes such problems, but I wish you continued success. What services do you plan to add next?

 

I've dabbled in game modding myself so I understand the tenacity it requires.
Can't wait for this one! ... no rush, just excited

 

Being in the process myself of making timetables, I know what a hassle it is. But keep up the good work! Looking forward to release

 

Thanks for the feedback and encouragement everyone! Long distance trains are up next.

 

Is coupling included?

 

Yes.

 

I just wanted to quickly share this screenshot of an RB33 train leaving Dresden-Neustadt. No particular reason

 

A quick hint: I've made it a habit to immediately enter the DisableAllScreenMessages command when starting the editor (it isn't recognised by the autofill feature so must be typed manually). This removes the red warnings in the top left from any screenshots and I don't need them anyway since I'm only editing a timetable and they have to do with route issues anyway.

Nice screenshot!

 

Love to see the ICE1 in action more. I'm yet to take a good picture of it irl because Frankfurt flughafen Fbf isn't very pretty. ingame it's a good difference from all the ICE 3 we see. especially without the IC2 as well.

 

Good call, Isaak! This shot of a 143 on an Elbe-Elster network train does look much better without that red text.

 

DRA2023V3? Is this your 3.rd version? Respect, my third versions of test timetables are usually just one service repeated. Real good progress.

 

Do I spot a railtour easter egg?

 

It's not a railtour. Thanks to that railtour service on Semmeringbahn, I found out that the door controls on the Vectron actually work with the LFR IC coaches, so I'm using these on the Berlin-Praha EuroCity trains now.

 

Ah. well still very cool to see. something new and interesting to spice up the railscene. I played DRA yesterday and had a weird service. one of the journey mode RB15's. I think the rush hour one around 17:30. it was a 143 with a single dosto wagon and another 143. For expecting a normal consist it sped up real quick. I can't find it anywhere in timetable mode so I'm really confused to how it appears but fun to drive nonetheless. would that have driven in dresden?

 

That's not real, no. I think you can force a service to use a specific loco when creating a Journey - looks like someone made a mistake and replaced the cab car with a 143 by accident. You're lucky the train doesn't have two cab cars!

Aside from that, RE15/18/RB33 aren't very realistic in the default timetable, I'm afraid. The Dosto formations are too short (3 coaches in real life), have the cab car on the wrong end, use the wrong tracks in Dresden Hbf, and have completely fictional turnaround times.

 

Ah well it was a fun experience but I rather have something more normal. I notice with my own project for Salzburg - Rosenheim after finding the real life timetable some things have been put in realistically but a lot is very weird too. For example the RB's although just 111 and dosto seem to be fine but Freilassing is so weird and just wrong. With hearing matt say they are throwing ideas at the wall to extend DRA I am wondering what's going to happen with it. I wonder if the ÖBB 1116 drives in dresden at all. I saw it layering onto Dresden - Chemnitz but I'm not that familliar with the region.

 

You see ÖBB locos on freight occasionally. They tend to be Vectrons rather than 1116s most of the time, but I'll still let the 1116 sub in on freight.

 

cool. can't wait to see some nightjet livery headed freight train hahaha

 

Just a quick update: I finished added all long distance trains to the timetable a few days ago. However, I can't quite declare success yet for a few reasons:

• Moving the S8 to Dresden Hbf platform 2 has caused an interesting problem where their departure path from Dresden Hbf conflicts with the long distance trains going into platforms 1 and 3. That doesn't actually need to happen simultaneously, so I can make it work. However, the eastbound ICs/ICEs arrive at Dresden-Neustadt before the westbound S8 services become active, so it's a bit more complicated than just unchecking "dispatch beyond" on the GoTo Dresden-Neustadt node, and I'm waiting for a free afternoon to implement it.
• I've made a bunch of different changes to the Elbe-Elster Network trains over time for different reasons; apparently some of these interact with each other poorly, resulting in the AI drivers now driving their eastbound trains from the rear cab. I'll need to go into the formations and service settings and make them stop doing that.
• Some of the long distance trains are one-offs that differ from the clockface schedule quite a bit. These have some small timing issues (not surprising since I have only tested the clockface trains previously) that I'll need to fix.

 

I'VE DONE IT!



All passenger services are complete and working. That's one thousand four hundred and ninety-one services, roughly one-third to one-half of which are playable. I am extremely happy to have reached this huge milestone after more than half a year of working on this project - I couldn't step away from my computer during the last simulation run, and seeing the clean log file at the end was genuinely a really emotional moment. I have to say I'm really proud of myself!

 

CONGRATS !!!
Edit:

WOW

 

amazing. I'm so happy after all the retries you managed to finish all the passenger services. DRA is a very complex area I myself don't even grasp the size of yet. I am nearing the end of my research for SRM. and thanks a lot for telling me to just do it. although I am too busy to work on it all the time. I am very much enjoying how far I have come and can't wait to show the special services I found driving there that I'll try to put in. your troubles and issues but also achievements have helped and enabled me to do a lot too and will too. I am a bit worried I'll start the setup of the timetable wrong but at least my research will be correct and not needing any change.

1491 is a lot of services. and I can't wait to see how you manage to implement and weave freight into that. an impressive achievement still and I can't wait to enjoy DRA more than I already do. good luck on the rest of the timetable.

 

Congratulations! That final timetable simulation is always scary.

 

Well done! Now comes the fun of messing it up with unruly freight traffic!

 

Cograts! What a milestone. Celebrate it

 

Congrats! Now another phase has started where the freight services can mess up everything haha good luck!! And thanks for all the help by documenting everything you encountered during the making of the timetable. I hope you will continue to do so.

 

Thanks for the kind words everyone! I took yesterday off, but today I've been back doing what I love: simulating the timetable for an hour only to find that everything's broken because I told a train to load passengers at Coswig for 30 minutes instead of 30 seconds.

I started doing railtours and other special services today. I want to have a wide variety of them appearing seasonally, and I'm either basing them on trains that I've seen run in real life, or I'm making up a story behind them.

In September, there's a Wine Festival in Meißen, so during that month there will be a 110 with n-Wagen going back and forth between Dresden Hbf and Meißen Triebischtal every other hour. It's nice to drive the Meißen Branch with an RE-style stopping pattern, and as you can see below, I'm using the opportunity for some unusual pathing through Coswig as well.

 

I always felt that coswig felt really empty. glad it's getting more services as I am still learning how that station works. every time you post something new apart from wanting me to play your timetable more and more you keep inspiring me to add more stuff to mine, like the TEE 8 I found recently.

 

Mh, I haven't, like, gone in-depth analyzing the original timetable, but I think it pretty much has all the trains it needs to for Coswig: 1 S1 (2 at rush hour), 1 RE50, 1 RE15/18 and 1 RB31 per direction per hour. The amount of trains is fine, but there are a bunch of tracks that the DTG timetable doesn't use at all, like the third track that goes to the junction with the Meißen Branch that my railtour is taking, or the turn-off towards Friedrichstadt. So you won't necessarily see more trains at Coswig in my timetable, but they'll be doing more different things, and hopefully that'll feel interesting!

(I paid for all of the tracks, I'm gonna use all of the tracks!)

 

I started a new test timetable today. It's a completely empty world, except for a little 363 and some wagons. That means it takes a few minutes to simulate, instead of an hour, and I can mock-up, test, and refine my shunting services in there before copying them into the real timetable. Very useful since you've got to tweak a lot of little things lots of times on shunting services, and work is much faster this way.

The screenshot shows one of Dresden Friedrichstadt's resident 363s working the Concrete Sleeper Factory at Coswig.

 

Smart way of doing that!

 

I can't recommend it enough! Absolutely indispensable for when you just need to make one service work *by itself*. Need to tinker with a stop marker? Weird signalling issues when coupling vehicles together? Copy it into the test timetable, make it work, copy it back.

 

I have noticed that it’s not perfect if doing on larger scale, when copying a healthy amount of nodes to do this method I found some nodes were randomly missed. At least that’s what is happening with me. I’ve had to be diligent to check by dragging the whole selection down a bit and then looking for wild node links indicating a node was not selected. And then you have to reset all your “call on dependencies” after pasting from one timetable to another.

But yes it’s an excellent way to develop freight and I’ve had fun with it.
My biggest problem now is that I’ve made one freight layer using a combination of several DLC assets that are all intermingled. So probably not good but if you have all the DLC it works.

 

Oh yeah, I've run into the problem where node selection itself becomes unreliable once you've got too many of them too... but since I'm usually only copying across single services for testing, that's not something I'm worried about.

Well, it depends on if they really need to interact, doesn't it. For a mixed freight train, that's the only thing you can do.

 

I have decided to add all my freight on MSB on a single layer too because of this reason: a lot of shunting operations connect stock of different DLC's with each other. First I wanted to keep everything as separated as possible, but this would limit the playability a lot or would require too many different shunting locomotives for which I had insufficient space, so I decided I'm mainly building the timetable to enjoy it myself so a lot of DLC will be required if you want to enjoy freight traffic on the line (MSB, RSN, DB BR 363, DCZ, DRA, LFR, NID and DB BR 204 if I'm not forgetting any).